‘Return these 8 million people into repayment’: Trump’s second term won’t fight student loan debt
Under Trump, Student Loan Forgiveness has turned into Student Loan Vengeance.
Trump is planning to put the kibosh on Biden’s efforts to cancel the debt of millions of Americans. It’s not surprising, considering he himself considered the idea of debt forgiveness “vile”. During his 2016 presidential campaign, he referred to himself as the “king of debt” citing the use of debt to be one of the ways that he built his personal “fortune.” Now it appears that he intends to use trillions of dollars worth of student debt to build up his own political fortune.
It’s a move that’s sure to appease (some) of his base, considering that GOP lawyers have spent years challenging Biden’s attempts at student debt forgiveness in court. Trump is set to inherit Biden’s SAVE plan, a sweeping attempt to wipe away student debt across the nation, that was struck down by the Supreme Court. The court ruled that Biden lacked the authority to make such a decision, and subsequent attempts to erase student debt are met with the same basic argument: it’s Congress’ job to spend the money, not the President’s.
For the 8 million people that enrolled in SAVE, the future of their student loan debt is unclear. If SAVE is deemed legal in subsequent court proceedings, the Trump administration could simply trash it. If SAVE is deemed illegal, then only an appeal from the Department of Education (the Department Trump previously stated he wanted to eliminate) can save it.
If the politics of Linda McMahon, the former WWE exec slated to lead Education are to be considered, it’s unlike that SAVE will find salvation. McMahon served as the chair of the America First Policy Institute, a Project 2025 adjacent organization that called Biden’s student loan plans “unlawful, counterproductive, and deeply unfair.” I could describe tricking a 17 year old into accepting tens of thousands of dollars of student debt the same way, but hey, what do I know?
While SAVE could be simply repealed at an executive level, dealing with the collective defaulted debt of the millions of SAVE enrollees is another matter entirely. According to Scott Buchanan, head of the Student Loan Servicing Alliance, the process of dismantling SAVE and recalculated enrollees’ debts could be a months long process. “It certainly wouldn’t be an overnight sort of reversal,” he said. It’s not a simple fix if that’s where the next administration goes.”
“The Trump administration is going to have to return these 8 million people into repayment,” said Persis Yu of the Student Borrower Protection Center. Yu’s organization has fought for the elimination of student debt, and Yu has said that the pathway to an affordable repayment plan for those millions of people is “incredibly unclear.”
White House spokesperson Angelo Fernández Hernández spoke out about the inherent irony of Republican efforts to eliminate student loan forgiveness. “Republican elected officials have repeatedly attempted to block their own constituents from getting lower payments and receiving the relief they are eligible for,” he said. Considering that the GOP was able to convince low wage workers into voting for a candidate whose economic policies will eviscerate them come tax season and cause a widespread rise in prices as at stores around the nation, I’d say it’s all par for the Republican course.
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